The United States has returned a 51-hectare housing area of Camp Zukeran in Ginowan, Okinawa Prefecture, as part of a 2013 agreement to reduce the prefecture's burden from hosting U.S. military bases.
The move on Tuesday represents the second U.S. land return under the agreement, following the handover of 1 hectare in the Makiminato Service Area in August 2013.
"We will try to realize the next base return as early as possible," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said in Tokyo. "We will reduce the burden in a visible manner."
Even with Tuesday's housing area return, Okinawa still hosts 73.8 percent of the total acreage of U.S. military facilities in Japan, prefectural officials said.
The Japan-U.S. agreement also envisages returning the 481-hectare U.S. Marines Corps Air Station Futenma in Ginowan to Japan in fiscal 2022 or later, if a replacement facility can be built in the Henoko area in Nago. However, local opposition to the proposed replacement base remains fierce.
Ginowan and the prefectural government plan to develop the housing area into an international medical center, including a heavy particle radiotherapy facility for cancer treatment, and the medical department and hospital of the University of the Ryukyus.
A prefectural high school, an urban park and housing will also be developed there.
However, construction isn't expected to be finished for another 10 years as the central government must check the area for unexploded shells and soil contamination.